Leaders in Research
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| Farzaneh A. Sorond, MD, PhD Assistant Professor of Neurology Brigham and Women's Hospital Harvard Medical School
Dr. Sorond's research activities are aimed at understanding cerebrovascular physiology and underlying mechanisms of impaired cerebral blood flow regulation in aging and cerebrovascular disorders. For her Beeson Project, Dr. Sorond plans to examine the hypothesis that that hypoxia inducible transcription factor-1 (HIF-1) can be pharmacologically activated in elderly humans and that pharmacologic augmentation of HIF-1 expression can improve age-related changes in cerebrovascular function. She will use the iron chelator Desferrioxamine (DFO) and a dietary flavonol, quercetin to examine HIF-1 activation in aging as well as vascular responses to acute and chronic HIF-1 activation in cerebrovascular aging, which have not been previously investigated in humans. Findings from this study will pave the way for clinical trials of HIF-1 activators in a number of hypoxic-ischemic geriatric disorders, especially cerebrovascular disorders such as ischemia and vascular cognitive impairment, which pose a significant health burden in our aging population. Dr. Sorond is a graduate of Baylor College of Medicine Medical Scientist Training Program. She completed her residency in neurology in the Harvard-Longwood Neurology Training Program and her fellowship in Stroke and Neurocritical Care at Brigham and Women's Hospital and the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, MA.
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| Primary Research (for Beeson Program): Hypoxia-inducible Transcription Factor 1 (HIF-1) in Vascular Aging
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Advancing age is associated with a number of geriatric syndromes linked to hypoxic-ischemic injury, such as cerebral microvascular disease, autonomic failure with orthostatic hypotension, stroke, dementia and congestive heart failure. Underlying all of these conditions lays the aging blood vessel, damaged with a dysfunctional endothelium. Potential corrective therapies are unknown.